An Open Letter To Jeremy Corbyn

Dear Jeremy,

You will continue to play a central role in the Socialist movement in these islands and in Europe. You have broken new life into a campaign to create a fairer society, and to balance private and public sectors of the economy. You have, with John McDonnell, put public-social-ownership back on the political agenda in Britain for good. That is one reason why the moneyed oligarchs fought against you with such venom and vindictiveness. Your dignity and principle has inspired many of us. Many tens, even hundreds of thousands, joined or rejoined the Labour Party because of that. These were specially YOUNGER people, under thirty-five: this bodes so well!

S we represent as the inter…………. The future despite the setback. Bu it also brought back, as I know, many tens of thousands of veterans from past campaigns, many like myself, who left the Labour Party over nuclear weapons, Vietnam, the policy in the Middle East, and of course Iraq.

Because of you and John, and those individuals who shared your principles, a tremendous Election Manifesto set out a collective path for the decades ahead. We will NOT return to the party of Tony Blair; but we have worried about some of the company you have kept, and about the old “bureaucratic apparatchiks” of the Labour Party. We have also worried about a lack of substance in the approach to Europe: Why is the internationalism of the party and movement is not more clearly harnessed to a strategy and in REFORMING THE EUROPEAN UNION by co-operation it can help move Brussels away from austerity and also towards a stronger global role for peace instead of NATO. This where your pro-Europe stars, like the admirable Keir Starmer now have a more CENTR

AL role to play. I understand the tactical .. of linking pro- and anti-EU factors for the election in a compromise “deal”. But that is now history. We must support clearly the idea resuming a role as one of the 28. The imminence of new younger leaders, especially women MPs (Jess Phillips) prover grapple hope and now a channel is set if some new candidates in seats lost – they will be not only younger, with more …………………………. And because of you, a renewed Socialist vision.

The Party has changed, as has its base; in my view it will increasingly appeal to young radicals in all constituents, not just traditional industrial areas so important as the rise of Labour in the 20th Century.

You helped achieve a 33% vote on a radical, socialist manifesto. It is a victory and a defeat, and at each local election and bye-election this base can be built on. But our power, your influence, is as you say to continue our MOVEMENT beyond party differences and internal debates, to be inclusive, and above all trans-national and beyond borders.